The Weinstein Company Picks Up Antoine Fuqua’s Boxing Drama SOUTHPAW

The game of “hot potato” over the long-in-development boxing drama Southpaw continues. The pic was initially developed as a starring vehicle for Eminem, centering on a welterweight’s rise to a championship title “as he battles various tragedies in his personal life and wins back the love of his daughter.” Kurt Sutter (Sons of Anarchy) wrote the script and Antoine Fuqua (Training Day) came aboard to direct in the summer of 2011 only to see DreamWorks back out of producing the film soon thereafter. MGM and Sony subsequently stepped in to take control of the property, but last spring the studios decided to put the film on the backburner.

Fuqua moved on to helming the upcoming White House actioner Olympus Has Fallen in the meantime, but now another studio looks to be stepping up to get the film back on track: The Weinstein Company. Hit the jump for more.

Per the LA Times, The Weinstein Company has bought the rights to Southpaw. Fuqua is still attached to direct, and has already been meeting with Weinstein executives to discuss casting (Eminem is no longer involved). The report notes that production could start as soon as this year, but Fuqua has a bounty of projects in various stages of development, so it’s unclear what he’ll direct next. He’s working on a Miles Davis biopic with Don Cheadle, he’s attached to helm the crime drama Chicagoland, and he’s also set to direct an adaptation of the non-fiction book Storming Las Vegas.